Trust chairman Mike Barnham said all farming started with well-trained young people, of who there was a shortage, so getting involved was an easy decision for the trust.
“I have a passion for training young guys,” he said.
“Our whole industry is so short of young farmers, so I took no talking into to have a look at the option.
“The Waipaoa board came down to Moeangiangi and fell in love with it as an ideal place for the cadet training farm.
“We now have a draft trust deed in front of us which is going to be signed off shortly.”
The easy part for Barnham was saying “yes let’s do it”, the hard work started now and would take a lot of time, he said.
The work will include setting up the infrastructure of a training facility.
“We’re going to spend about $3,000,000 ... to have lovely new accommodation, a cook house, lecture theatre, all this sort of thing.”
The cadetship will be a two-year programme and the first intake of five will be from 2027, Barnham said.
It will be a similar format to the former Waipaoa scheme and there would be no shortage of applicants with bigger farm training schemes like Smedley always being over-subscribed, he said.
“This operation will be different [from Smedley].
“This is smaller and more intimate, we’ll have a point of difference on the training of these young people based on a lower number.”
Barnham said information about the farm cadet course would be coming out soon to encourage young people to think about Moeangiangi as a training option and also to get potential funders or people in agriculture to hear more about the plan.
“You can’t sell a secret, so we need to start telling people more about it from now,” he said.
– RNZ
